Chapter twelve
Lai
Either my car was showing his age and had forgotten where home was, or this was about to become a very unpleasant story.
It did not belong in Ghost’s place.
That John fellow was not here. I knew it before Ghost had finished pulling up outside.
The place simply didn’t feel right. No– that wasn’t quite it.
The house felt too right. It was clean, renovated, and gentrified within an inch of its life.
Someone had taken an old rural property, scraped away every sign that people had once lived imperfectly inside it, then rebuilt it as a lifestyle block for people who liked the idea of the country but preferred their mud contained and their livestock several fences away.
The lawn was clipped short, the garden beds were edged in fresh timber, and even the gravel had been raked into submission.
The only rural thing that remained was the scent of cattle, but even that was aggressively fought off with a wall of climbing jasmine.
I adjusted my coat, attempting to cover as much of my bare chest as dignity demanded, then reached into the back seat for my cane. My coat was stained, my hair was a lost cause, and there was oil beneath my fingernails; it would come down to my charm, then.
Thankfully, I had plenty of that.
I slipped from Ghost and approached the door, pausing at the electric doorbell. My finger hovered over the button until my training took over, and I pressed it with my knuckle rather than leave a clean print.
Retirement had not cured me of everything.
A soft chime echoed through the house; a few seconds later, footsteps approached from the other side of the door.
The lock turned, but the security chain remained in place as the door opened three cautious inches.
An older Asian woman peered at me through the gap, her gray-streaked hair pulled into a loose bun.
She wore a floral apron over a faded T-shirt.
Her gaze traveled from my bare chest to my face, then down to my cane, assessing me for danger.
“Yes?” She asked.
“Good evening.” I offered her my most harmless smile and inclined my head. “I’m sorry to disturb you, but I’m looking for someone- an older gentleman named John. I was told he lived here?”
Her expression changed; surprise first, then recognition. Then something close to pity. The door closed, and I heard the chain slide from its channel before her wary face greeted me again. “Come in,” she said.
Southern hospitality was still alive and well; if only she knew what she was inviting into her home.
“Thank you.” I wiped my boots against the mat before stepping inside. I was aware of the cultural need to remove my shoes, but I wasn’t going to stay long, and I was already wearing too little.
The living room was as tidy as the exterior; new furniture, family photographs on the walls.
A child’s school portrait sat on the mantel beside a small ceramic elephant.
There was no trace of whoever had lived here before, not even the faint discoloration left when old pictures were removed from the walls.
“Is John home?” I asked, stepping into the room.
The woman looked back at me, still wary, but I saw dread in the tense lines of her forehead, too. “Haven’t you heard?”
My stomach sank. There was no conspiratorial hush in the question that suggested salacious gossip, so I knew that whatever was going to follow was going to be bad.
“I’m afraid I have not.”
She motioned for me to follow her through to the kitchen. “I’m sorry to have to tell you this, but John passed. About a year ago, now.”
There it was; the answer Ghost had spent a year tearing himself apart to find.
For one selfish instant, I wished I had never pushed him toward it.
It would’ve been so much easier to believe that John wanted a payout and a simpler car in his old age, something fuel-efficient, with air conditioning.
Hate is easier to suffocate than grief. Grief doesn’t fade as easily; it settles like a mineral deposit over stone, polished by running water until it’s smooth enough not to hurt. Softened, but never gone.
“I’m so sorry to hear that. Do you know what happened?”
“Only what the neighbors told us.” The woman opened the refrigerator and removed a glass jug of tea.
Before I could refuse, she poured some into a cup and placed it in front of me.
“It was bad business; he was killed. Robbery gone bad,” she continued.
“Apparently they wanted his car, but he wouldn’t give them the keys. ”
Behind my ribs, something cold tightened.
“His car?” I asked, though I already knew it was true. “Someone killed him over his car? What the Hell kind of car was it?”
“I don’t know; some vintage thing.” She waved vaguely, as though all cars belonged to the same species. “The neighbor said it was very valuable. John had kept it for years.”
I lifted my glass and drank the entire thing in one gulp.
The tea was so cold and sweet that it made my teeth ache, but it did nothing to numb the thought forming in my mind.
How the hell was I supposed to tell Ghost the truth?
He was going to blame himself forever. The guilt would eat at him worse than any rust.
“Did they catch who did it?” I asked, the grief in my voice very real, though it wasn’t for John.
“No; the cops reckoned it was gang-related,” the woman said, watching my face with growing concern. “Are you a relative?”
“Nephew,” I lied without blinking. “We lost touch a while ago.”
“I’m sorry.”
“Thank you.” I set the empty glass down carefully. “Tell me more about the gang?”
She hesitated. Perhaps my tone had changed. I had tried to keep it gentle, but some things sharpened regardless of intention.
“I don’t know much; they were just lowlifes stealing old cars. The police warned us when we bought the house. We had to install cameras just in case.”
I wasn’t listening anymore. My mind was back with the Challenger.
I couldn’t give Ghost solace. Not truly. I couldn’t return thirty years to him, nor could I resurrect the man who had spent them at his wheel. I would never be able to make the loss smaller or provide an answer that did not hurt.
But there was one thing I could give him.
Something I understood.
I could give him revenge.
I thanked the new house owner for the drink and wished her well as I left. I heard the chain rattle back into place behind me.
Smart lady.
◆◆◆
The driveway was far too short.
I needed miles. Hours. Days, maybe. But Ghost’s silhouette was already shimmering in the driver’s seat, waiting for me. His hands rested rigidly on the wheel, and the blue glow of his eyes followed every step I took toward him.
By the time I reached the driver’s door, I still had not found a kind way to tell him.
There was no kind way.
“I’ll drive,” I said.
Ghost didn’t argue. That alone unsettled me more than any mechanical noise could have. He silently obeyed, vanishing from behind the wheel and reforming in the passenger seat as I climbed inside.
“Did you talk to him?” He asked.
My knuckles tightened against the leather.
I had delivered death notices before; In my previous line of work, I was usually responsible for the death, and occasionally for the notice as well. I would have thought I’d have a better handle on the job, but none of that had prepared me for this.
“Not exactly,” I muttered, turning the key in the ignition.
The engine struggled to turn over. I grasped the steering wheel, trying to figure out the best way to break the news.
Ghost was anxious. I could feel it. The car sat lower to the ground; he was quieter, and his gear shift was reluctant to move.
“Let’s go for a ride,” I declared as the motor finally started, my foot easing off the clutch.
This wasn’t the time to play the passenger princess.
Right now, Ghost needed me, and I needed time to figure out the best way to deliver the worst possible news.
So we drove. I wasn’t sure where I was taking him.
Away from any painful memories, I guess.
The whole drive, I felt his gaze on me. Watching, waiting.
I finally dared to meet his eyes when we pulled into the empty car park of an abandoned truck stop.
A recently built highway had stolen all traffic away from the old rural road, and, like most mom-and-pop stops, this one was closed, boarded up, and forgotten.
I sat for a moment, listening to the creak of the old sign, working up my courage.
“Ghost? Come sit with me for a minute.” I stepped out of the car, reaching into my pocket and fishing out a pack of cigarettes as I did.
I’d confiscated them from Al a couple of days ago; he wasn’t supposed to smoke, and I gleefully tortured him under the guise of concern.
I had intended to throw the pack away eventually.
Instead, I kept forgetting it was there.
I placed one cigarette between my lips and searched my pockets for a lighter.
Ghost appeared beside me before I found one. He leaned close, his face inches from mine, and touched the end of the cigarette with the glowing heat of his lips. It flared orange, then settled into a bright ember.
“What did he say?” Ghost demanded, watching me inhale a lungful of smoke. The bitter sweetness gave me something to focus on; I held it for a moment before letting the smoke spill slowly between my lips.
“He didn’t say anything.”
Ghost stared at me.
“He wasn’t there,” I added.
“Where was he?”
I sighed and looked toward the boarded truck stop, buying myself one more second. There was no good way to deliver the next line. I could only hope the old muscle car was built strong enough to survive the impact.
“He’s dead.”
Ghost’s engine died. Not with the reluctant sputter of an old machine losing power; every sound simply ceased at once, leaving the countryside unnaturally quiet.
I turned toward the shadow beside me. His features were almost gone, with barely a glow where his eyes were. I reached out to make sure he was still there, and he vanished as I touched his cheek, my fingertips passing through the empty air.
I didn’t push. I didn’t ask if he was okay.
Of course he wasn’t okay.
A loss for most humans is devastating. Family, lovers, friends, pets–it hardly mattered what shape love had taken; it still hurt when it vanished.
But for Ghost? Whoever John was, he had been Ghost’s everything.
Cars didn’t have parents or children. All they had to lose were their owner and themselves.
Right then, Ghost was losing everything.
Yes, he had me. Legally, financially, and increasingly against my better judgment, he had me.
But we had known each other for only a few weeks.
I could not be offended that those weeks did not outweigh the thirty years he’d spent with John.
I knew the difference between blossoming affection and love already lived.
I leaned back against Ghost’s side and smoked in silence, the cigarette burning slowly between my fingers.
Ash collected at the tip before dropping into the damp grass, and I watched the cherry creep closer to the filter, brightening whenever the wind moved through it.
Ghost remained hidden, though now and then I felt a faint tremor pass through the metal supporting my back.
When the heat reached my fingers, I let the cigarette fall and crushed it beneath my boot.
“He didn’t leave you,” I said.
Ghost didn’t answer.
I tilted my head back against him and looked up at the dark, starless sky. “He didn’t abandon you in that impound lot.”
A chill moved through the metal. Beside me, the air warped as Ghost tried to pull together his usual shape, though grief made him unstable.
His shoulder appeared first, then the hard outline of his face.
The blue glow of his eyes flickered weakly as he stared at me, silently demanding the rest of the story.
I gave it to him. “He was murdered.”
The gentle blue glow of his eyes paled, narrowing as a strong hand grabbed my jaw. I watched as his throat swelled with heat and fire, gears grinding in a blood-curdling growl.
“By WHOM?”
The words did not sound human. His engine roared back to life behind me, the force of it shaking the abandoned car park. Every panel rattled with rage, grief, and a violence too large for the shape attempting to contain it.
“I don’t know,” I said.
Ghost’s grip tightened on my face. I held his gaze.
“But I intend to find out.”